Abstract
Abstract The abundant and unpredictable use of fossil fuel accelerate the continuous search in that field of an alternative source. Most of the researchers are attracted to the solar power, that is one of therenewable and sustainable energy sources. Based on the current scenario, in futurethe energy requirement will be tremendously high. The effectiveuse of solar energy can be reduced the problem of huge energy demand in all agricultural, industrial, domestic and power production sectors. In agricultural sector, one of the areas is drying technology. The drying technique is one of the applications of the solar energy. Drying is the process of removing moisture from the agricultural produce. From our ancestor to modern humanbeing, various improvement occurs in the solar drying system. The indirect solar drying with integrated flat plate collector is most popular, simple in design, cost effective, maintenance free and easy to operatevegetable drying system. The flow of air movement, thermal leak proof cabinet structure, flat plate collector’s (FPC) absorber plate design, optimum thickness of selective coating materials, etc. directly affect the efficiency and moisture removing rate of the solar drying system. Here, the 15 kg green chili has been taken for drying in solar drying system. The dryer is integrated with phase change materials (PCM) in drying trays, flat plate collector’s absorbing plate coated with activated charcoal and black board paint, the variable air mass flow rate of the blower. It has been found that, at 0.008 kg/s air mass flow rate the outlet temperature of the FPC is 96 °C and efficiency is 33%. The drying time was 16 h as compared with open sundrying time 28 h for the 15 kg chili. It was compared with indirect solar dryer without thermal energy storage and found that the time required for drying chili with thermal energy storage is 4 h less than the without thermal enrgy storage solar dryer.
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